% Issue 190, JANUARY 2013, of the Active Galaxies Newsletter is
%% now available (as a postscript (gzipped), pdf or LaTeX file)
%% at:
%%
%% ******** http://www.manchester.ac.uk/jodrellbank/~agnews ********
%%
%% ************** agnews@manchester.ac.uk ****************
%%
%% This new issue is also included below in its LaTeX version.
%%
%% As editor of the newsletter I am very interested to hear
%% any suggestions or feedback regarding the newsletter. So do not hesitate
%% in emailing me your suggestions.
%%
%% Many thanks for your continued subscription.
%%
%% Melanie Gendre
%%
%%=====================================================================
%% Active Galaxies Newsletter
%% Web - http://www.manchester.ac.uk/jodrellbank/~agnews
%% Email enquiries & Submissions - agnews@manchester.ac.uk
%%=====================================================================
%%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%%
%% Issue 190 - (LaTeX Version)
%%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{amssymb}
\usepackage{hyperref}
\textwidth 18cm \textheight 23cm \oddsidemargin -1cm \topmargin 0cm
\parskip 0.15cm
\parindent 0pt
\small
\begin{document}
\arrayrulewidth 0.04cm
%VERSION 3
\begin{center}
\begin{tabular}{|p{6.0cm}|p{8.5cm}|} \hline
& \\
\multicolumn{1}{|l|}{\hspace{0.5cm}\LARGE\bf\sf Active}
& \multicolumn{1}{|c|}{\large\em An electronic publication dedicated to}\\ [0.3cm]
\multicolumn{1}{|l|}{\hspace{0.5cm}\LARGE\bf\sf Galaxies} & \multicolumn{1}{|c|}{\large\em the observation and theory of}\\ [0.3cm]
\multicolumn{1}{|l|}{\hspace{0.5cm}\LARGE\bf\sf Newsletter} & \multicolumn{1}{|c|}{\large\em active galaxies}\\ [0.3cm]
\hline
& \\
\multicolumn{1}{|c|}{\large\bf\sf No. 190 --- JANUARY 2013 } &
\multicolumn{1}{|c|}{\bf\sf Editor: Melanie Gendre (agnews@manchester.ac.uk)} \\ [-0.1cm]
& \\ \hline
\end{tabular}
\end{center}
\small
\begin{center}
{\Large\em Accepted Abstracts - Submitted Abstracts - Thesis Abstracts\\
Jobs Adverts - Meetings Adverts - Special Announcements}
\end{center}
\begin{center}
{\Large\sf From the Editor}
\end{center}
\vspace*{0.1cm}
The Active Galaxies Newsletter is produced monthly. The deadline for contributions is the last day of the month. The Latex macros for submitting abstracts and dissertation abstracts are appended to each issue of the newsletter and are also available on the web page.
As always as editor of the newsletter I am very interested to hear any suggestions or feedback regarding the newsletter. So do not hesitate in emailing me your suggestions.
Many thanks for your continued subscription.
\begin{center}
Melanie Gendre
\end{center}
\vspace*{0.6cm}
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
\begin{center}
{\Large\sf Abstracts of recently accepted papers}
\end{center}
\vspace*{0.6cm}
{\large\bf{X-ray and Multiwavelength Insights into the Inner Structure of High-Luminosity Disc-Like Emitters}}
{\bf{B.~Luo,$^{1,2}$ W.~N.~Brandt,$^{1,2}$ M.~Eracleous,$^{1,2}$ Jian~Wu,$^{1,3}$ P.~B.~Hall,$^{4}$ A.~Rafiee,$^{5}$ D.~P.~Schneider,$^{1,2}$ and Jianfeng~Wu$^{1,2}$}}
$^{1}${Department of Astronomy \& Astrophysics, 525 Davey Lab, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802, USA}\\
$^{2}${Institute for Gravitation and the Cosmos, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802, USA}\\
$^{3}${College of Information Sciences and Technology, 316F IST Building, Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802, USA}\\
$^{4}${Department of Physics \& Astronomy, York University, 4700 Keele Street, Toronto, ON M3J 1P3, Canada}\\
$^{5}${Department of Physics, Astronomy, and Geosciences, Towson University, Towson, MD 21252, USA}
{We present X-ray and multiwavelength studies of a sample of eight high-luminosity active galactic nuclei (AGNs) with disc-like H$\beta$ emission-line profiles selected from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 7. These sources have higher redshift ($z\approx0.6$) than the majority of the known disc-like emitters, and they occupy a largely unexplored space in the luminosity-redshift plane. Seven sources have typical AGN X-ray spectra with power-law photon indices of $\Gamma\approx1.4$--2.0; two of them show some X-ray absorption (column density $N_{\rm H}\approx10^{21}$--$10^{22}$~cm$^{-2}$ for neutral gas). The other source, J$0850+4451$, has only three hard X-ray photons detected and is probably heavily obscured ($N_{\rm H}>3\times10^{23}$~cm$^{-2}$). This object is also identified as a low-ionization broad absorption line (BAL) quasar based on Mg II $\lambda2799$ absorption; it is the first disc-like emitter reported that is also a BAL quasar. The IR-to-UV spectral energy distributions (SEDs) of these eight sources are similar to the mean SEDs of typical quasars with a UV ``bump'', suggestive of standard accretion discs radiating with high efficiency, which differs from low-luminosity disc-like emitters. Studies of the \hbox{X-ray}-to-optical power-law slope parameters ($\alpha_{\rm OX}$) indicate that there is no significant excess X-ray emission in these high-luminosity disc-like emitters. Energy budget analysis suggests that for disc-like emitters in general, the inner disc must illuminate and ionize the outer disc efficiently ($\approx15\%$ of the nuclear ionizing radiation is required on average) via direct illumination and/or scattering. Warped accretion discs are probably needed for direct illumination to work in high-luminosity objects, as their geometrically thin inner discs decrease the amount of direct illumination possible for a flat disc.}
{ Accepted by MNRAS}
{E-mail contact: lbin@astro.psu.edu,\newline preprint available at \href{http://arxiv.org/abs/1211.4033}{arXiv:1211.4033}}\\\\\\
%-------------------------------------------------------------------------
{\large\bf A survey for H{\sc \,i} in the distant Universe: the detection of associated 21-cm absorption at {\boldmath $z=1.28$}}
{\bf S. J. Curran$^{1,2}$, M. T. Whiting$^{3}$, A. Tanna$^{4}$, E. M. Sadler$^{1,2}$, M. B. Pracy$^{1}$ and R. Athreya$^{5}$}
$^{1}$Sydney Institute for Astronomy, School of Physics, The University of Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia\\
$^{2}$ARC Centre of Excellence for All-sky Astrophysics (CAASTRO)\\
$^{3}$CSIRO Astronomy and Space Science, PO Box 76, Epping NSW 1710, Australia\\
$^{4}$School of Physics, University of New South Wales, Sydney NSW 2052, Australia\\
$^{5}$Indian Institute of Science Education and Research, 900, NCL Innovation Park, Dr Homi Bhabha Road Pune, Maharashtra 411008, India\\
{We have undertaken a survey for H\,{\sc i}\ 21-cm absorption within the host galaxies of $z\sim 1.2 - 1.5$ radio sources, in the search of the cool neutral gas currently ``missing'' at $z\gtrsim 1$. This deficit is believed to be due to the optical selection of high redshift objects biasing surveys towards sources of sufficient ultra-violet luminosity to ionise all of the gas in the surrounding galaxy. In order to avoid this bias, we have selected objects above blue magnitudes of $B\sim 20$, indicating ultra-violet luminosities below the critical value of $L_{\rm UV}\sim 10^{23}$ W Hz$^{-1}$, above which 21-cm has never been detected. As a secondary requirement to the radio flux and faint optical magnitude, we shortlist targets with radio spectra suggestive of compact sources, in order to maximise the coverage of background emission. From this, we obtain one detection out of ten sources searched, which at $z=1.278$ is the third highest redshift detection of associated 21-cm absorption to date. Accounting for the spectra compromised by radio frequency interference, as well as various other possible pitfalls (reliable optical redshifts and turnover frequencies indicative of compact emission), we estimate a detection rate of $\approx 30$\%, close to that expected for $L_{\rm UV}\lesssim 10^{23}$ W Hz$^{-1}$W Hz$^{-1}$\ sources.}
{Accepted by MNRAS}
{E-mail contact: sjc@physics.usyd.edu.au,\newline preprint available at \href{http://arxiv.org/abs/1212.2754}{arXiv:1212.2754}}\\\\\\
%-------------------------------------------------------------------------
{\large\bf{Probing nuclear activity versus star formation at $z\sim0.8$ using near-infrared multi-object spectroscopy}}
{\bf{ C. Ramos Almeida$^{1,2}$, J. M. Rodr\'\i guez Espinosa$^{1,2}$, J. A. Acosta-Pulido$^{1,2}$, A. Alonso-Herrero$^{3,4}$, A. M. P\'erez Garc\' ia$^{1,2}$, N. Rodr\' iguez-Eugenio$^{1,2}$ }}
$^{1}$ {Instituto de Astrof\'\i sica de Canarias (IAC), C/V\'\i a L\'{a}ctea, s/n, E-38205, La Laguna, Tenerife, Spain} \\
$^{2}$ {Departamento de Astrof\' isica, Universidad de La Laguna, E-38205, La Laguna, Tenerife, Spain} \\
$^{3}$ {Instituto de F\' isica de Cantabria, CSIC-Universidad de Cantabria, E-39005 Santander, Spain} \\
$^{4}$ {Augusto Gonz\'alez Linares Senior Research Fellow}\\
{We present near-infrared (NIR) spectroscopic observations of 28 X-ray and mid-infrared selected sources at a median redshift of $z\sim0.8$ in the Extended Groth Strip (EGS). To date this is the largest compilation of NIR spectra of active galactic nuclei (AGN) at this redshift. The data were obtained using the multi-object spectroscopic mode of the Long-slit Intermediate Resolution Infrared Spectrograph (LIRIS) at the 4.2 m William Herschel Telescope (WHT).
These galaxies are representative of a larger sample studied in a previous work, consisting of over a hundred X-ray selected sources with mid-infrared counterparts, which were classified either as {\it AGN-dominated} or {\it host galaxy-dominated}, depending on the shape of their spectral energy distributions (SEDs).
Here we present new NIR spectra of 13 and 15 sources of each class respectively. We detect the H$\alpha$ line at $>1.5\sigma$ above the continuum for the majority of the galaxies. Using attenuation-corrected H$\alpha$ luminosities and observed Spitzer/MIPS 24 $\mu$m fluxes, and after subtracting an AGN component estimated using an AGN empirical correlation and multifrequency SED fits, we obtain average star formation rates (SFRs) of 7$\pm$7 and 20$\pm$50 M$_{SUN}~yr^{-1}$ respectively (median SFRs = 7 and 5 M$_{SUN}~yr^{-1}$).
These values are lower than the SFRs reported in the literature for different samples of non-active star-forming galaxies of similar stellar masses and redshifts (M$_*\sim 10^{11}M_{SUN}$ and $z\sim$1). In spite of the small size of the sample studied here, as well as the
uncertainty affecting the AGN-corrected SFRs, we speculate with the possibility of AGN quenching the star formation in galaxies at $z\sim0.8$. Alternatively, we might be seeing a delay between the offset of the star formation and AGN activity, as observed in the local universe.}
{ Accepted by MNRAS}
{E-mail contact: cra@iac.es,\newline preprint available at \href{http://arxiv.org/abs/1212.3008}{arXiv:1212.3008}}\\\\\\
%-------------------------------------------------------------------------
{\large\bf{Variability and the X-ray/UV ratio of active galactic nuclei. II. Analysis of a low-redshift Swift sample}}
{\bf{ F. Vagnetti$^{1,2}$, M. Antonucci$^1$, D. Trevese$^2$ }}
$^1$ {Dipartimento di Fisica, Universit\`a di Roma ``Tor Vergata'', Via della Ricerca Scientifica 1, I-00133, Roma, Italy} \\
$^2$ {Dipartimento di Fisica, Universit\`a di Roma ``La Sapienza'', Piazzale Aldo Moro 2, I-00185 Roma, Italy}
{Variability, both in X-ray and optical/UV, affects the well-known anti-correlation between the $\alpha_{ox}$ spectral index and the UV luminosity of active galactic nuclei, contributing part of the dispersion around the average correlation (``intra-source dispersion"), in addition to the differences among the time-average $\alpha_{ox}$ values from source to source (``inter-source dispersion"). We want to evaluate the intrinsic $\alpha_{ox}$ variations in individual objects, and their effect on the dispersion of the $\alpha_{ox}-L_{UV}$ anti-correlation. We use simultaneous UV/X-ray data from Swift observations of a low-redshift sample, to derive the epoch-dependent $\alpha_{ox}(t)$ indices. We correct for the host galaxy contribution by a spectral fit of the optical/UV data. We compute ensemble structure functions to analyse variability of multi-epoch data. We find a strong ``intrinsic $\alpha_{ox}$ variability", which makes an important contribution ($\sim40\%$ of the total variance) to the dispersion of the $\alpha_{ox}-L_{UV}$ anti-correlation (``intra-source dispersion"). The strong X-ray variability and weaker UV variability of this sample are comparable to other samples of low-$z$ AGNs, and are neither due to the high fraction of strongly variable NLS1s, nor to dilution of the optical variability by the host galaxies. Dilution affects instead the slope of the anti-correlation, which steepens, once corrected, becoming similar to higher luminosity sources. The structure function of $\alpha_{ox}$ increases with the time lag up to $\sim$1 month. This indicates the important contribution of the intermediate-long timescale variations, possibly generated in the outer parts of the accretion disk.}
{ Accepted by A\&A }
{E-mail contact: fausto.vagnetti@roma2.infn.it,\newline preprint available at \href{http://arxiv.org/abs/1212.3432}{arXiv:1212.3432}}\\\\\\
%-------------------------------------------------------------------------
{\large\bf{Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbon in the Central Region of the Seyfert 2 Galaxy NGC\,1808.}}
{\bf{Sales, Dinalva A.$^{1,2}$, Pastoriza, M. G.$^{1,3}$, Riffel, R.$^1$, and Winge, Cl\'audia $^{4}$}}
$^{1}$Departamento de Astronomia, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Porto Alegre, RS, 91501-970, Brazil\\
$^{2}$Department of Physics, Rochester Institute of Technology, 84 Lomb Memorial Drive, Rochester, NY 14623, USA\\
$^{3}$Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Cient\' ifico e Tecnol\' ogico, Brazil\\
$^{4}$Gemini Observatory, c/o Aura, Inc., Casilla 603, La Serena, Chile\\
{We present mid infrared (MIR) spectra of the Seyfert 2 (Sy~2) galaxy NGC\,1808, obtained with the Gemini's Thermal-Region Camera Spectrograph (T-ReCS) at a spatial resolution of $\sim$26\,pc. The high spatial resolution allowed us to detect bright polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) emissions at 8.6$\mu$m and 11.3$\mu$m in the galaxy centre ($\sim$26\,pc) up to a radius of 70\,pc from the nucleus. The spectra also present [Ne\,{\sc\,ii}]12.8$\mu$m ionic lines, and H$_{2}\,S$\,(2)12.27$\mu$m molecular gas line. We found that the PAHs profiles are similar to Peeters's $A$ class, with the line peak shifted towards the blue. The differences in the PAH line profiles also suggests that the molecules in the region located 26\,pc NE of the nucleus are more in the neutral than in the ionised state, while at 26\,pc SW of the nucleus, the molecules are mainly in ionised state. After removal of the underlying galaxy contribution, the nuclear spectrum can be represented by a Nenkova's clumpy torus model, indicating that the nucleus of NGC\,1808 hosts a dusty toroidal structure with an angular cloud distribution of $\sigma = 70^{\circ}$, observer's view angle $i = 90^{\circ}$, and an outer radius of R$_{0}\sim$0.55\,pc. The derived column density along the line of sight is N$_H$\,=\,1.5\,$\times\,10^{24}$\,cm$^{−2}$, which is sufficient to block the hard radiation from the active nucleus, and would explain the presence of PAH molecules near to the NGC\,1808's active nucleus.}
{ Accepted by MNRAS 2012 }
{E-mail contact: dassps@rit.edu,\newline DRAFT is available at \href{http://arxiv.org/abs/1212.1357}{arXiv:1212.1357}}\\\\\\
%-------------------------------------------------------------------------
{\large\bf{An X-ray and Multiwavelength Survey of Highly Radio-Loud Quasars at \boldmath $z > 4$: Jet-Linked Emission in the Brightest Radio Beacons of the Early Universe}}
{\bf{ Jianfeng Wu$^{1,2,3}$, W.~N.~Brandt$^{1,2}$, Brendan~P.~Miller$^4$, Gordon~P.~Garmire$^1$, Donald~P.~Schneider$^{1,2}$, and Cristian~Vignali$^{5,6}$ }}
$^1$ {Department of Astronomy \& Astrophysics, The Pennsylvania State University, 525 Davey Lab, University Park, PA 16802, USA} \\
$^2$ {Institute for Gravitation and the Cosmos, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA 16802, USA} \\
$^3$ {Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, 60 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA} \\
$^4$ {Department of Astronomy, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI 48109, USA} \\
$^5$ {Dipartimento di Astronomia, Universit\`{a} degli Studi di Bologna, Via Ranzani 1, I--40127 Bologna, Italy} \\
$^6$ {INAF -- Osservatorio Astronomico di Bologna, Via Ranzani 1, I--40127 Bologna, Italy} \\
{We present a systematic study of the \hbox{X-ray} and multiwavelength properties of a sample of 17 highly radio-loud quasars (HRLQs) at \hbox{$z>4$} with sensitive \hbox{X-ray} coverage from new {\it Chandra} and archival {\it Chandra}, \hbox{\it XMM-Newton}, and {\it Swift} observations. Eight of the new and archival observations are reported in this work for the first time. New {\it Chandra} observations of two moderately radio-loud and highly optically luminous quasars at \hbox{$z\ \gtrsim 4$} are also reported. Our HRLQ sample represents the top $\sim5\%$ of radio-loud quasars in terms of radio loudness. We found that our HRLQs have an \hbox{X-ray} emission enhancement over HRLQs at lower redshifts (by a typical factor of $\approx3$), and this effect, after controlling for several factors which may introduce biases, has been solidly estimated to be significant at the 3--4$\sigma$ level. HRLQs at $z=3$--4 are also found to have a similar \hbox{X-ray} emission enhancement over $z<3$ HRLQs, which supports further the robustness of our results. We discuss models for the \hbox{X-ray} enhancement's origin including a fractional contribution from inverse Compton scattering of cosmic microwave background photons. No strong correlations are found between the relative \hbox{X-ray} brightness and optical/UV emission-line rest-frame equivalent widths (REWs) for radio-loud quasars. However, the line REWs are positively correlated with radio loudness, which suggests that relativistic jets make a negligible contribution to the optical/UV continua of these HRLQs (contrary to the case where the emission lines are diluted by the relativistically boosted continuum). Our HRLQs are generally consistent with the known \hbox{anti-correlation} between radio loudness and \hbox{X-ray} power-law photon index. We also found that the two moderately radio-loud quasars appear to have the hardest \hbox{X-ray} spectra among our objects, suggesting that intrinsic \hbox{X-ray} absorption ($N_{\rm H}\sim10^{23}\ {\rm cm}^{-2}$) may be present. Our \hbox{$z>4$} HRLQs generally have higher \hbox{X-ray} luminosities than those for the composite broad-band spectral energy distributions (SEDs) of HRLQs at lower redshift, which further illustrates and supports the \hbox{X-ray} emission enhancement of \hbox{$z>4$} HRLQs. Some of our HRLQs also show an excess of mid-infrared emission which may originate from the synchrotron emission of the relativistic jets. None of our \hbox{$z>4$} HRLQs is detected by the {\it Fermi} LAT two-year survey, which provides constraints on jet-emission models.}
{ ApJ in press}
{E-mail contact: jwu@head.cfa.harvard.edu,\newline preprint available on the \href{http://arxiv.org}{arXiv}}\\\\\\
%-------------------------------------------------------------------------
{\large\bf{Fundamental parameters of FR II radio galaxies and their impact on groups and clusters environments}}
{\bf{ A.D. Kapi\'{n}ska$^1$ \ and P. Uttley$^2$}}
$^1$ {Institute of Cosmology \& Gravitation, University of Portsmouth, United Kingdom} \\
$^2$ {Astronomical Institute `Anton Pannekoek', University of Amsterdam, Netherlands}
{Radio galaxies are among the largest and most powerful single objects known and are found at variety of redshifts, hence they are believed to have had a significant impact on the evolving Universe. Their relativistic jets inject considerable amounts of energy into the environments in which the sources reside; thus the knowledge of the fundamental properties (such as kinetic luminosities, lifetimes and ambient gas densities) of these sources is crucial for understanding AGN feedback in galaxy clusters. In this work, we explore the intrinsic and extrinsic fundamental properties of Fanaroff-Riley II (FR II) objects through the construction of multidimensional Monte Carlo simulations which use complete, flux limited radio catalogues and semi-analytical models of FR IIs' time evolution to create artificial samples of radio galaxies. This method allows us to set better limits on the confidence intervals of the intrinsic and extrinsic fundamental parameters and to investigate the total energy produced and injected to the clusters' environments by populations of FR IIs at various cosmological epochs ($0.0